


Glimmer

by ambiguously



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 01:54:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5112023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/pseuds/ambiguously





	Glimmer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Zdenka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zdenka/gifts).



By day, Míriel is trapped inside her life, trapped inside the grand palace, her entire life a cage. She is Pharazôn's prize, his light, enclosed in glass and named Zimraphel, the utterly forlorn. She casts her eyes up as the sun makes her slow way across the sky and flees into the West, and Míriel's heart drowns with her.

In the moonlight, in her dreams, her parents come to her speaking in the true tongue. Isil races past as she wanders free, chained only by mere flesh. Even the hulking brute in her bed cannot hold her.

Mother and Father tell her many things. She knows of the bodies, writhing their last upon Sauron's cursed pyres. She knows her husband's plans. "Beg forgiveness, little jewel," they whisper to her, and she tries. She wakens and she kneels to the West, and she pleads in her disgrace for Manwë's forbearance. But the West is silent.

Not all the birds belong to evil. She sends a message with a gull to Amandil. "Hurry." She could have loved him. Tonight she can only pray he is spared.

Morning comes, and the slow horrors of her life suffocate inwards. The ships are gathering in a great fleet, and the world will end if Pharazôn has his way. "Please," she begs, on her knees again in the light of day, but Pharazôn is even colder than the Valar and will not stop his plan. His heart, ever crinkled, has devoured itself under Sauron's watchful eye, and is given over to Morgoth. Míriel is nothing more than a doll.

Sunset comes. Her heart drowns again. Míriel sleeps alone tonight, as her husband finalizes his plans. She closes her eyes, awaiting the beloved embrace of the two she most misses in this long exile inside her own home.

"Child," says the voice, and Míriel looks upon the face of She Who Weeps for the World.

"My Lady," she whispers, on her knees once more, feeling the brush of the tears falling like a blessing upon her hair as she bows.

"There is no hope for Númenor."

The ache which has pained her these last many years threatens to break her wholly. "I know."

A hand lifts her chin. Míriel gazes on Nienna. "Look, little jewel. This once, look and see."

They turn together. In her dream, Míriel is far-seeing, past all vision of Men or Elves. At the edge of her sight, she can see the Isle. And she knows she is dreaming, and she knows that this is not real, for just beyond the mountains, she sees the faintest glimmer, and she knows it is the Light of the Two Trees.

She cries out in her mother tongue, the words of joy spoken by the Eldar and handed down to her, the last Queen of Númenor, never Ar-Zimraphel but for now and always Tar-Míriel.


End file.
